30 Kasım 2011 Çarşamba

messy text to messy reality

the inconsistency of the self, the multi-directionality of it makes it hard to pin it down in a comprehensive text. hence using  such a medium as a research tool, and plus as the object of the research bound to produce anecdotal, dispersed outcomes, `messy texts` as Norman Denzin (1997, Interpretive Ethnography) would call it, where the connections between parts, transitions are somewhat floating.

the practice of art, can imply an experience, rather than claim to know and represent it. It approaches to its trophy , it is always in the approaching, in experimenting.  not claiming to grasp it tightly, so that there is no space for it any more to move.

in a sense, my struggle of understanding this new everyday language, the inability to grasp it, be a fluent speaker of it is echoed in this acceptance of the impossibility of knowing, the problem of representing.


given that i have to use this language, the text, I should consider what it does to doing, to practice.
writing does something else, it can depict, unearth, reveal something else. there will be always gaps between them, bits that cannot be covered. from those gaps, new possibilities will arise.

the more I attempt to grasp the practice with words, keywords, the more i try to find ally, the suspicious I become about my practice, this research methodology, the whole research.



doubt as an anti-body to truth

27 Kasım 2011 Pazar

yurmurtatavuk problemi

burada vaka analizi yaptigimiz yer pratigimiz mi, pratigimizin kendine zemin buldugu, icinden ciktigi yabancilik hissimiz mi.
yani gundelik hayatimizin mi etnografisini yapiyoruz, yoksa pratigimizin mi?
ikisini de yapar gibiyiz, bi taraftan bu karsilasmalarin bilgisini, intibasini not ediyorum iste suraciga. sonra o suracigin tortusu diyelim hadi, sairane olsun, iste ordan kendine kaynak bulan, o hissiyat uzerine kurulmus bi pratikten bahsediyoruz. sonra bu pratikte o gundelik olanin izlerini bulmaya, pratigin kendi dinamiklerini bi duzene sokmaya, onda bi duzen bulmaya calisiyoruz.
belgeselvari isler yapsam, hani kelimenin tam anlamiyla belgesel kategorisine ilistirebilecegim isler yapsam bu etnografi yapma iddiasi daha kolay sindirilirdi tabi. retorik herseyin ilaci. gene bu pratigin bir ara alanin artifactlarini urettigini iddia edebilirim. arada kalanin kurgusal arsivi.


conceptualise and interpret

... [W]here does ethnography begin if not in a disciplined attempt to discover and describe the symbolic resources with which the members of a society conceptualize and interpret their experience?' Keith H. Basso and Henry A. Selby, Meaning In Anthropology (Albuquerque: Univ. of New Mexico Press, 1976), 3. represents with a claim of reality, truth, explain, builds a story out of the fieldwork data collected. to clarify things, I should also think about what ethnography tries to do, what it aims. especially after the reflexive turn, when the acceptance of the partiality of the researcher brings the truth claims into dispute. in that sense, if ethnography is not claiming to give truth, capture reality any more, what it does? it does not claim to explain, but describe, represent, with the acceptance that representation is not an unproblematic issue, that it cannot capture the complexity, multidimensionality of the field. to contextualise myself do i (really) need to start from my story, the bits that would exoticize my position? like the ethnical background of my family? in this research context, i find it unnecessary if not self-sabotaging. what is relevant is how i am dealing with the encounter of a totally new, alien set of everyday language, habits, that requires me go through a reorientation. and yes, every case, for every individual it will be different, according to their background, upbringing, and their personal accents, defects etc. but the limits of the context needs to be drawn carefully. it needs to be anecdotal, im not saying big sentences in my practice, and i cannot do that in the writing.

26 Kasım 2011 Cumartesi

i am not claiming that i am doing autoethnography, i am exploring the possibilities of doing it

try to look into the ways, means, tools of autoethnography that can be used, appropriated to what extent they can work together. so, it is an experiment, a process where the tools of fieldwork is applied, the limits of fieldwork is questioned, the excess (bodily) knowledge fieldwork produces is looked at. the juncture where the ethnographer`s work approaches to the everyday routines of the new comer. What makes this project autoethnography, apart from its being derived from my own experiences? A collection of anecdotes, the little pseudo ethnographic stories for the ones who have not been here. A collection of first hand experiences,travel stories the amazements turned into, becomes the moving points, origins developing into visual representations, expressions, into visual language. Those amazements occur at an unexpected encounter, that marks a crack on my perception, my common sense. A breaking point that changes the picture slowly, every time. This also changes my relation with that reality, with every tiny step, addition to that experience, my new experiences is being refashioned. My perception is changed. So does the practice illustrate this, represent this what has it got anything to do with fieldwork? Collection of impressions, notes, stories, observations that help you to perform better in that new reality next time, as a newcomer. Next time you are locked in the flat you would know calling for lockersmith is not an option, if you are not the landlady of the flat. You would know, how you would ask for things. So you inhabit that local knowledge, you grow into that language. and it becomes the field, your data, later to be uttered, interpreted not with the language of ethnographic writing, but with the language of art practice. And the work the work comes from there. The practice is-does ….what is the verb-noun here? What is the function of practice? So far I have uttered some alternatives: illustrate? Made –up artifacts that embodies that experience Witness to the process, or maybe documentation of that process. documentation of some sort From the very outset, how does a work is conceived, developed, and put into full fruition, finished? Practice is the ground where the experience is unfolded-translated into the artistic language And translation relies on the meaning and then the feeling of a text I reckon. Translation of the experience into practice. I use common sense, clichés, sterotypes, images, objects that can be easily associated with, and tear their familiarity down , rely on this abbreviated, symbolic language that is being fed by our basic and sometimes wrong ideas about ourselves, and use that clichés to speak about a personal experience. To give the observer, the audience something she can easily associate, and then strip him-her bare off this knowledge, drag those taken for granted perception, push them further into unfamiliar guises. to kind of undo them.

she lowered her voice

as we were talking about not the very best parts of the aspects we associate with britishness. feeling of guilt the uncontrollable outrage, despair felt due to this inability to understand, grasp this new set of attitutes, behaviours, habits that is mis-directed to the people, to locals. because it is not easy to accept the failure of knowing, understanding, the (sometimes) unbreachable gap between the strange and familiar and the feeling that you are always going to be a stranger

your language can be a home to a total stranger

the previous day of our conversation with her, I was speaking to a friend over phone. she told her grand-grand mother and grand mother speaking turkish, when they are speaking something secret. then tried to remember some words, as long as she remembers. as her grand-grand mother died when she was young, she was not able to listen to that language and forgot most what she knew. "gel burada" "tamam" and she said something else, but I guess it was greek. i remember my grandmother calling me something like `ezgoritdeme` and give me slime kisses on the cheek. i later on learned that it means, `ill sacrifice myself for you` in kurdish than she told me that her grandmother used to cook such nice kadayifi, and she couldnt have any kadayif as delicious as hers after her death. `when you were speaking i felt home` she said the conversation prior to this story was about how the body changes, its rhtyhm and habits transforms, the climate of the body slowly adjusting to the climate, light, winds, temparature of its new habitat. i grow dandrufs, my skin gets lighter, whiter, paler due to lack of sunlight and my skin gets dry and the lack of sunlight and the mood swings what they call the winter blues

18 Kasım 2011 Cuma

şey-eşya

Gathering and assembly, by an ancient word of our language, is called “thing”. our thinking has of course long been accustomed to understate the nature of the thing. the consequence, in the course of western thought, has been that the thing is represented as an unknown X to which perceptible properties are attached. heidegger, building,dwelling, thinking, s. 151

17 Kasım 2011 Perşembe

gesso-akrilik-calico

ve zımpara

1 Kasım 2011 Salı

Wir leben in einem Zeitalter der Überarbeitung und der Unterbildung, in einem Zeitalter, in dem die Menschen so fleissig sind, dass sie verdummen. Oscar Wilde alıntı için d.s.e teşekkürler

richard wentworth